THE LABOR PROBLEM 
IN INDIA 


BY 


B. P. WADIA 


President, Madras Labor Union, Madras, India 


au 


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THE LABOR PROBLEM 
IN INDIA 


By B. P. Wapia 
President, Madras Labor Union 


Labor conditions in India are exceptional, for in that vast country labor 
is not organized; it is exploited by the capitalistic class; its interests are not 
watched by the Government; the working hours are extremely long; the 
wages are miserably low; the housing problem is in the stage of mere 
academic and theoretic discussion. The only place where recently an effort 
has been made to organize labor is the city of Madras, where five unions 
have been formed—the Madras Labor Union, Madras Tramwaymen’s Union, 
Madras Rickshawallas’ Union, Madras Printers’ Union, and Madras Rail- 
way Workshop Union. I am the President of the first of these and am in 
America as a representative of all of them. I came here as an advisor to 
the labor delegate at the International Conference at Washington, D .C. 


The tendency of the official policy is to regard Indian labor as sub- 
servient to the industrial development of India. Such an attitude may 
obscure the fact that Indian labor will be allowed to be exploited as hitherto. 
Capitalistic exploitation, in the name of growing Indian industries, has 
already taken place, and that ought not to be permitted any longer. The 
welfare of the Indian laborer should not be sacrificed for the sake of “grow- 
ing industries”; the betterment of his lot should not be relegated to a second 
place, and a primary position given to the improvement and growth of 
young or new industries. 


Hours 


The last inquiry into factory conditions in India was conducted in 
1908, as a result of which the Factories Act was amended in 1911]. That 
Act is now in force. The Report of the Indian Factory Labor Commission 
admits that “in textile factories excessive hours are frequently worked in 
cotton mills; in all jute mills weavers are employed for excessive hours,” 
and it makes mention of seventeen and eighteen hours a days in ginning 
factories; twenty to twenty-two hours in rice and flour mills; the textile 
factories of Bombay working “four fourteen hours or more”; those of 


3 


Ahmedabad and Broach working in summer for fourteen hours and more; 
mills in Agra working fifteen and a quarter hours per day in summer, and 
thirteen and three-quarter hours in winter; factories in Delhi working “four- 
teen, and even fourteen and a half hours.” What was the outcome of the 
Report? The Act was amended, and now “no person shall be employed in 
any textile factory for more than twelve hours in any one day” (Indian Fac- 
tories Act, Chap. V., para. 28). A textile factory can employ a laborer for 
twelve hours per day for six days of the week, i.e., seventy-two hours per 
week. What is the recess in this twelve hours working-day? The Act pro- 
vides that half-an-hour’s recess should be given to the worker. This thirty 
minutes period is divided between three functions—going out of the mills, 
taking a meal and returning to the mills. Careful observation carried on 
in Madras where arrangements are better than in many mills in other places 
showed that a man does not get more than twelve to thirteen minutes for his 
actual meal. 

The twelve hours day with its ridiculous thirty minutes recess has another 
side. The workmen in almost all cases live miles away from factories, and 
as was rightly pointed out by a high Government official recently, “from the 
standpoint of the worker, the time in going to and returning from the fac- 
tory must be added to the length of his active day.” In Bombay, where tram 
and train services are available, one hour at the least must be added, and I 
know instances, in Madras, where the distance has to be walked, that laborers 
have to leave home at 4.30 a. m. to be at the factory gate at 5.45, and do not 
reach home till 8 p. m. 

The result of this excessive long hours’ system is far reaching. It 
tells on the efficiency of the work; it produces the phenomenon peculiar 
to Indian factory labor—viz., loitering; it leads to premature exhaustion; 
it drives the Indian laborer away from the factory, as “the operative becomes 
unable to stand the strain of work under present conditions at a compara- 
tively early age.” Dr. T. M. Nair, in his Minute of Dissent to the Commis- 
sion Report, characterizes the system thus: “A system more likely to bring 
about degradation of labor is impossible to conceive.” 


Wages 


I am in a position to give some detailed figures of payment received 
by workmen in textile factories, which go to prove the miserably low wages 
prevalent in India. It may be contended that living in India is cheap; 
but when the rise in the prices of foodstuffs and clothing material is taken 
into account, when a personal inquiry into the lives of the workmen is made, 
and when we see the hovels they live in, the food they eat, the clothes they 
wear, and remember that they are always in debt, which is ever-increasing, 
we cannot but come to the inevitable conclusion that the scale of wages 
is scandalously low and is absolutely inadequate to meet the demands of 
sheer existence at the present time. It is said that the standard of living 


4, 


of the Indian workman is low. It is necessary to remember in this connec- 
tion that the wage allowed him leads to malnutrition, and that the latter has 
to be remedied before a better standard of living, housing, clothing, etc., 
can be thought of. The Indian laborer may be addicted to living cheaply; 
but even the most frugal temperament would not choose malnutrition and 
all its consequences, for the sake of cheap living; and, further, what about 
the debt the laborer is constantly incurring? Low wages compel him to 
borrow at high rates of interest, and with the help of his miserable earnings 
plus his borrowed money he manages to exist. Life in a dingy hovel on 
scanty food shows the courage and patience of the Indian laborer. Malnu- 
trition is provable, and all I need to do is to copy the following table, which 
shows that prisoners in jails are better nourished than the Indian opera- 
tives. This explains the remark of the manager of a big Nagpur factory 
that “those accustomed to mill life regard it as worse than jail life.” 


STATEMENT SHOWING THE AVERAGE WEIGHTS OF PRISONERS AND OF 
. MILL OPERATIVES* 


42) 3g oO 
ie S84 3 
S-@ | Average | 2 |Average | 6.2 | Average 
he . © . o . 
Province Oe weight |2.2| weight | 3 3 | weight REMARKS 
sg | inlbs. |2 >| in lbs. e » | inlbs 
=e ae 8 5 9 
es : ae 
2 = 
| 
Bombay: (222225... | 2,656 | E212 735 | 102.093 | 288 | 104.810 
Central Provinces] 1,746 | 110.45 100 | 100.92 52 | 107 
Beneals (2 ceees | 6,834 | 106.187 | 140 | 107.939 | 32 | 106.25 | Average weight of 
| | | | prisoners in the 
| | | | United Prov- 
| | inces, 115.08 lbs. . 
Eastern Bengal| | | 
and Assam ..|' 3,046.) 110.846 } 20°) 108 Pensa ss 
| | | | Average weight of 
| | | . prisoners in the 
Burmg res boone 120.51 WAR Ee UO BY: Ad alee UB ape Rajamundy Cen- 
tral Jail, Madras, 
generally, 114.38 
lbs. 
WSC ASS Oe co. | 114.38 | 104 | 103.634 
P| 


of Agra and| 
Saas! 9 115.08 | 117 
intact 5 120.42 | 115 


110.705 


107.016 
113.808 


Nots.—In Bengal probably the most accurate comparison is with prisoners in the United 
Provinces; in Burma with prisoners in Madras generally, and more particularly with 
prisoners in the Rajamundry Central Jail, which is situated in the tract from which 
the majority of the Madrasi laborers in Burma are recruited. 


on 


The problem of wages was not examined by the Factory Commission 
of 1908. The member of the Indian Civil Service quoted above says, “Labor 
may be cheap, but life is not,” and it is not difficult to prove that India 
suffers, in more ways than one, on account of the scandalous wages paid 
to the laborer; this happens when all the time the capitalists are hoarding 
wealth—mill agents getting their handsome commissions, and shareholders 
their big dividends. 

To substantate these general remarks I give below a few typical figures 
which can tell their tale more eloquently than my words. Take these earn- 
ings of workers in the cotton mills of Bombay, of the jute mills of Bengal, 
of the leather works of Cawnpore, etc., and compare them with wages 
of Lancashire and Dundee and other factories in the United Kingdom 
generally. 


Specimen Wages in the Cotton Mills of Bombay— 


Drawer ‘(eard: room) 2702-0 22) 3 RAMEN a ge TEL 
ReGen eo re Pe eee eee Ue RE SS 
Reve Co lcr ae Go, sae ee eres 
Deiter. :Ccard room) oo et ee ee 4.20 
WW GAVEL Fi rat oe en ete de ess a 15.64 


Wages are paid monthly, with two to three weeks in arrears. 

These sample rates were prevalent in Bombay in 1918, and include 
War Bonus. Again, these rates are in Bombay, and wages are higher there 
than in other places. Against this let me give a few items from the Bombay 


Exchange List for June, 1919: Share Value 

Dividend Original Present 
Ahmedabad Advance —---------- 40% $166 $470 
Wiathradag’ cece oc ee ea ee 40% 166 370 
Kaetisecnandige. coe tee te ees 40% 166 370 
(PeaCenty weak ce ee ee 50% 33 84 
NEACIOIW IE Ree ooo 50% 166 Viz 
Mazaibnarnrecauc sea eee 56% 83 280 
Bombay lying 6 Seceae ee e 70% 83 527 
Central inGine st ke ee oe ey 80% 166 870 
SIROTA IMIR fo wana fc ee ene ee 100% 334 3,200 
Rpt eal pec! st eee See eos 120% 334 1,230 


forward. 
Specimen Wages in Jute Mills— 


Cardets (6b eh es ae ate Uae ee ee $3.00 
Ro Verso ea ee te rts Le eee ic 4.00 
Sninhers ask ee ot oe eee ee ee eee 4.91 
Shifters: 222 Pa es ae eo ae en SE eae eo eae 3.66 
Winders) oa I eR OY Oo ee 6.00 per month 
Bearers ia: sie eh ee Yee Be ieee area 7.33 
NU CAVCTS Fn ee ee eee Dee ees 9.00 
CETDPTICTS 2). koe 2- oe a ee ee ee eer eee 10.00 
765 0 (one hae en a A gil Es AS NE hc PAE es fond Sia i aa 4.50 


Wages are paid weekly, with one week in arrears. 


6 


In 1916-17 there were seventy-one mills running with 39,404 looms, 
employing 260,199 persons, with a paid-up capital, including debentures, 
but excluding reserves, amounting to twelve and a quarter million dollars. 
The annual turnout is 1,000,000 tons of raw material. 


The annual average value of the jute trade to Bengal has been com- 
puted at $200,000,000 at pre-war rate of exchange. In this connection the 
following, taken from the Financier of August 7, 1918, will be found in- 
structive: “Many commodities are scarce nowadays through the want of 
tonnage to bring them from foreign countries. A further contributive cause 
is the dearth of bags, in which grain, sugar, etc., are shipped; the price of 
jute sacks has accordingly risen to unknown heights. Hence the prosperity 
of the Indian jute companies, three of which, the Victoria, Titaghur, and 
Samnugger, have doubled their dividend to 20 per cent for the past year, 
against 10 per cent for 1916. The shares are tightly held in Dundee.” 


Specimen Wages in the Tanneries and Leather Works of Cawnpore— 


wehairers and. techers a5 $4.00 
Seolrersandisetierss 8k Oo a 4.00 h 
Slickevimwhiiieners ic on) Nee eye i 5.33 pescmone 
Machine Gperaters: io Sect k es es 7.16 


Specimen Wages to Workmen in Coal Mines— 


The average daily wage per head is 15 cents. 
The annual raisings per head of labor employed below ground for all India, 169.4 


In reference to wages must be mentioned some ways devised to throw 
dust in the eyes of the unwary. Some manufacturers have started what they . 
call a gratuity fund. Mr. M. C. Sitaraman, a retired weaving master of 
the Carnatic Mills of Madras, where this “Gratuity Fund” is worked, has 
well described its mode: 


The Gratuity Fund for workmen is a very ingenious device for securing constant 
and steady labor. It has its merits as well as its faults. A laborer, after ten years 
of satisfactory and continuous service, gets between five per cent and ten per cent of 
his total wages. On the other hand, it turns a workman into an avaricious and spirit- 
less slave of the system. Desirous of securing the gratuity fund, a workman gradu- 
ally loses his self-respect, puts up with treatments which under ordinary circumstances 
he would have revolted from, and invariably becomes a mere beast to dance to the tunes 
and insolent whims of his arbitrary superior in the department. It emasculates the 
workman and emboldens the foreman to stretch the exercise of his arbitrary power 
to the vanishing limit. Here I may mention a case that I know which has a touch 
of tragedy in its committal. A workman stole a lea (120 yds.) of red yarn to make 
a waist thread. He was found out at the gate, brought to the manager, who, after 
referring to the register, dismissed him without the least concern on his part. Usually 
stealing of a trivial nature is punished by the same manager by a fine of 25c. or 
50c. This particular workman had faithfully served nine years and eight months, 
and he was to get at his gratuity a lump sum of $50 in another four months. The man, 
broken-hearted, went home as if to his own funeral. I wish that workmen who have 
put in more than five years of service be treated more generously than in the aboye case 
by the mill authorities. 

7 


Capacity 


The inefficiency of the Indian workman is often adduced as the cause 
of low wages. The factory system in India is already fifty years old, and 
it is inconceivable that the Indian workman has made no progress. “India 
is the mother country of the textile industry, and up to the time of Ark- 
wright possessed the monoply of fine yarns”; outside experts like Mr. James 
Platt and Mr. Henry Lee are of opinion that “in no country on earth, except 
in Lancashire, do the operatives possess such a natural leaning to the textile 
industry as in India”; Dr. G. Von Schultze-Gaevernitz, a German expert, 
said in 1895 that the Indian laborer “does not stand far behind the Ger- 
man’’—that was twenty-five years ago. Dr. Nair, in his Minute of Dissent 
to the Report of the Indian Factory Labor Commission, says: 


And at the present time, according to the very careful calculations made by Mr. 
Simpson, of Messrs. Binny & Co., of Madras, a cotton mill in Madras with 35,000 
ring spindles, 800 looms, average count l6s., working 67% hours a week, would emplay 
2,622 operatives all told. Whereas for a similar mill in Lancashire, working 5434 hours 
a week, the total number of hands required would be 982, which works out a propor- 
tion of 2.62 Indian hands to one English hand. And if we also consider that the 
average monthly wage of a Lancashire operative will be about $20, and the average 
monthly wage of a Madras operative is $5, it is clear that for the same money the 
Indian millowner gets nearly double the work that an English millowner does. : 
Before condemning the Indian operative as inefficient and incapable of improvement 
he ought to be given a fair hearing. In a memorial submitted to His Excellency, the 
Marquis of Lansdowne, Viceroy and Governor-General of India in 1883, by the mill 
operatives of Bombay, it was stated that “it has been said to the detriment of your 
petitioners that an Indian mill operative is not as hard working as his brother work- 
man in England, and that a mill operative in England does the work of three men 


employed on the same work in an Indian mill. . . . The real cause of this, your 
Lordship’s petitioners submit, is the bad machinery and the bad raw material used 
in the mills. . . . The breakage in the thread is so continuous here on account 


of the bad quality of the cotton that millowners are compelled to employ more men.” As 
- the effect of the long hours has to be considered before judging of the idle habits 
of the Indian operatives, so the quality of the raw material they have to handle has 
to be taken into consideration before the extent of their skilfulness or otherwise is 
determined. 

It is also very necessary to point out that the so-called inefficiency of 
the Indian workman is rooted in a diseased body, and on “the incessant 
strain on his nerves amidst the din and noise of machinery in the stuffy 
atmosphere of the factory.” Major F. Norman White, M.D., I-M.S., Sani- 
tary Commissioner with the Government of India, writes: “A large part of 
the relative inefficiency of the Indian labor is due to removable pathological 
causes.” He makes a pertinent remark and I quote it here with a request 
that it may be considered in the light of all its implications: “Had the large 
employer of labor a plentiful supply of really healthy material to start 
with, he would still be under an obligation to secure for his operatives an 
environment above reproach; how much greater is the present need for 
hygienic environment, when in most cases cure has to precede the conserva- 
tion of health?” One more quotation from this expert is necessary, as it is 


8 


an important deduction relating to the subject in hand: “All are agreed 
that the organized labor of India (he means factory labor; not labor organ- 
ized in trade unions or labor centres) is relatively inefficient, and that the 
wage-earning capacity is low. It is difficult to assess the importance of 
disease as a contributory cause of this state of affairs.” 


Health and Sanitation 


Progressive sanitation is not a feature of the official programtze. The 
Indian Labor Factory Commission Report records how “one witness of long 
practical experience stated that any man would feel exhausted even if he 
merely sat in a chair in some of the workrooms for eight or nine hours, 
the atmosphere was so foul.” Sir Bhalchandra Krishna, an eminent physi- 
cian and publicist of Bombay, said to the Commission that there was physical 
deterioration among the millhands, and was careful enough to point out that 
“it is due to bad ventilation in the mills.” Doctor Chavan, a medical man 
of Ratnagiri, the district from which a large number of mill operatives come 
to Bombay, and one who has a large practice among them, is of opinion 
that “the mill operatives suffer to a very large extent from phthisis and 
dyspepsia.” The hovels in which they are compelled to live, the malnutri- 
tion which follows on low earnings, the premature exhaustion caused by 
long hours necessitate extraordinary sanitary facilities; but the Government 
of India are very backward in the matter of sanitation, and the necessity of 
special factory sanitation has not yet occurred to them. The recently pub- 
lished Indian Industrial Commission Report includes among its contents a 
paper on “Industrial Development and Public Health” by the Sanitary Com- 
missioner with the Government of India, in which the expert says that “the 
subject of industrial hygiene has received remarkably little attention in 
India, until quite recent times, and to-day its importance is not fully recog- 
nized in any part of the country.” 


Education 


Much has been said of the illiteracy of the Indian laborer. It is true 
that the average Indian laborer is not able to read or write. He and his 
educated countrymen have for many years demanded that primary education 
should be made free and compulsory, but the Government of India have 
failed to respond to that demand. However, it must be noted that the 
masses in India—and among them are the factory laborers—have a cul- 
ture of their own. Their power of understanding political and economic issues 
and suggesting proper remedies in a practical manner is well known to 
those who have worked for and with them. Their political instincts are 
clear and strong. Their ability to organize themselves was recently mani- 
fested in the formation of the trade unions in Madras referred to above; 
and it will be an agreeable surprise to lovers of labor in America to 


9 


note that a few months ago in Bombay a general strike of textile workers 
was declared and maintained for several days without any trade union 
organization in existence there. That strike involved some 70,000 laborers. 
This instance is given to show that Indian laborers do possess the capacity 
to combine and organize effectively. 


Lack of education, however, prevails. A few employers have opened 
schools for the children of their employees. Much is made by clever 
capitalists of such institutions, and instances are not wanting where the 
Government has given prominence to such ventures. But attention must be 
drawn to the important fact that it is one of the devices to enslave labor. 
To quote a retired weaving master, Mr. M. C. Sitaraman, of the Carnatic 
Mills at Madras: “The school, general and technical in character, is the 
best part of the whole affair—the best part of the institute from the manu- 
facturer’s point of view. This pays him in dollars and cents. This school 
trains up boys to become intelligent and skilled laborers and coolie clerks. 
This serves as a strong link of connection as well between the employers 
and the employees even under strained relationship.” Even the Indian Indus- 
trial Commission Report, published a few months ago, disposes of the whole 
problem in two short paragraphs under the heading “Education of Factory 
Children.” What hope is there, then, for the future? 


Housing 


As in the matter of education, the problem of housing has not attracted 
very serious attention from the Government. Some manufacturers have 
started schools for the children of their employees, so others have put up 
huts and houses for them. They have done this to secure some per- 
manence in the fluctuating Indian labor, and as the Indian Industrial Com- 
‘mission Report says, “in such cases employers have often found it impos- 
sible to obtain labor without providing accommodation”; and, again, “the 
more enlightened factory owner has found it advisable to provide accommo- 
dation on an increasing scale, recognizing that, though the rent which he 
can obtain will not pay him more than a trifling percentage on his outlay, 
the mill which houses its laborers best will command the pick of the labor 
market, especially in the case of such a fluid labor force as that on which 
the textile factories rely.” 


The actual conditions under which the laborers live are indescribable. 
In the City of Bombay—Urbs Prima in Indies—744,000 working men are 
tenanted in one-roomed houses; the room is generally eight feet by ten feet, 
and a death rate of 60 per 1,000 is known to prevail. 


10 


The Moral Issue 


In dealing with the problems of education, housing, gratuity fund, 
etc., | may have appeared to be unappreciative of the manufacturers who 
have tried to run schools or build houses or start gratuity funds. The factor 
to be borne in mind in this connection is the innate culture of the Indian 
laborer, which loathes the idea of slavery in any shape or form. The Indian 
laborers want to have schools for their children, houses for themselves, 
better wages and shorter hours—all as a matter of right and justice. The 
efforts on the part of the employers to patronize the laborers are seen as 
fetters of slavery, albeit golden fetters instead of iron ones. I have not 
referred to the iron fetters of personal abuse, kicking and other brutal prac- 
tices that still prevail on plantations and in factories. The Madras Labor 
Union is trying to put a stop to them by legal means. The new spirit is in 
evidence among Indian laborers who will not tolerate such brutalities any 
more; but it is well to recognize that even the above-named golden fetters 
are resented and the Indian laborer feels that he is not only a “hand,” but 
also that he has a head and a heart, and aspires to come unto his own. 


Non-Factory Labor 


While there is a semblance of factory legislation, labor outside the 
factory has not even that much of protection. Agricultural labor, on plan- 
tations and other places, has its own untold woes. The conditions in the 
mine settlements—e. g., Kolar goldfield—are not easily describable. — Let 
me speak of the large body of clerks in shops—especially shops in the 
wholesale Indian markets. There is no Shops Closing Act to limit the dura- 
tion of their working day; there is no shop-inspector; the twelve-hour day 
of the factory laborer does not apply to the shop-worker; they are “free 
to work” as long as they please, or, rather, as long as their benevolent 
masters like; they have no Sunday as a weekly holiday. Besides the occa- 
sional festivals—a few days in the year—only once a month, on each new 
moon day, the bazaars (market) are closed. The Indian bazaar does not recog- 
nize the value or necessity of a weekly day of rest. The bazaar opens early in 
the morning and does not close till very late at night. The European shops 
and Indian shops managed on European lines have fixed hours of work 
and Sunday as holiday, but Indian markets, with their thousands upon 
thousands of employees, have excessive hours without the weekly rest on 
Sundays. The wages of these shop employees are scandalously low and 
their prospects poor. The average man begins at $5 per month, and unless 
he proves to be exceptionally able, he has no hopes of rising above $20 per 
month, or so, at the end of his career. He only lives on the hope of a 
partnership or of setting up an independent business some day. 


Lest it be understood that the capitalistic public is the only culprit 
in this matter, let it be made clear that Government sets them a good example. 


11 


The Government is as much an exploixter of non-factory labor as any mer- 
chant prince or capitalistic concern. Take post office wages and see the 
rise the Government has worked in that department in the course of nearly 
half a century: 


1875—Wages ran between $1.37 to $2.37 per month. 
1915—Wages ran between $2.12 to $2.56 per month. 


I have purposely taken the Postal Department because of an incident 
to which I wish to draw the very pertinent attention of the Laborites and 
Trade Unionists everywhere. Here it is: 

There was recently a postal strike in Calcutta, and the grievances of 
the postmen, as is generally the case with labor troubles, related to the 
question of improvement in their pay. The matter, however, went to the 
police court, and six of the “ringleaders” in the strike have been sentenced 
to three weeks’ rigorous imprisonment each, and eight others to a fine of 
$7.00 each, or, in default, to ten days’ rigorous imprisonment. Dealing 
with this particular matter, a “Disgusted Briton” writes to the Statesman 
of Calcutta: 


All of these men are striking as a method of protest against that “graded salary 
of $5.00 rising to $8.25, which they hold to be insufficient to maintain themselves and 
their families, and which is below the rates paid to men in similar positions in Bombay. 
If the law obtaining in India permits the infliction of sentences of imprisonment for 
such so-called “offences” as these, surely it is about time the law was altered. If the 
sentences were permissible under the Defence of India Act, they would seem a gross 
misuse of power. It is easy, on $333.33 a month or over, to damn these poor men 
for causing us inconvenience; it is shameful to misuse our powers to imprison them. 
The rise in the cost of living in Calcutta is known to all, and when these men follow 
the countless precedents of the United Kingdom to endeavor to better their condition, 
we give them an answer that not only smacks of disgruntled despotism, but damns 
British justice, whatever the law may be. 


Conclusion 


The Government of India is an autocracy. The Indian Reforms under 
discussion in Parliament plainly indicate that the present machinery of 
autocracy will be maintained. The ears of autocracy are always deaf to 
the groans of the sufferer. The voice of the poor factory laborer will not 
even reach those ears, for it will be drowned amid the droning of the 
machinery of the rich capitalist, and the latter is the friend of the Govern- 
ment. There is a serious attempt to establish a living brotherhood of 
the laborers of the world, and the Indian laborers fondly look to organized 
labor in the United States to champion their cause. As their spokesman, 
on their behalf, I am putting forward this condensed statement. I appeal 
to those who hold the cause of Labor and Trade Unionism sacred to stretch 
their hands of fellowship to their comrades in India. Remember the Cause 


of Labor is one. 


12 3 , e 


